Braintree vital records (Vital Records and Church Records of Braintree, Massachusetts)

Braintree, Massachusetts was incorporated as a town May 13, 1640, being formerly known as “Mount Woollaston”.  Portions of the original town of Braintree were separated to towns of Quincy (1792), Randolph (1793), and the town of Holbrook (1872).  Consider consulting the records for church and cemeteries in these communities when looking for Braintree ancestors.

The primary source records for this town were transcribed by Waldo C. Sprague from the originals held by the Braintree Town Clerk Office, various churches and private sources.

The records that form this database are part of the collection donated from the estate of Mr. Sprague in 1962 to NEHGS.  Included with his notebooks were thousands of small paper slips (the entire collection includes some 34,000 slips) measuring 6 x ½ inch in size. Sprague used these slips as an alphabetical index after he transcribed the records into his notebooks. The slips were sorted alphabetically, and tied into bundles.

Waldo C. Sprague Biography

This original text is part of the R. Stanton Avery Collections at NEHGS [SG/SPR/17/4a/ Vols. 1 & 2].  Also three small boxes of slips created by Sprague (described above) [SG/SPR/17/3/Inv. Loc. 11/A/2/a-c].